Playboy is a magazine that, for more than a half century, has been mostly known to the wider audience for its stylized pictures of naked women. What a lot of people do not know is that the magazine, with its editor in chief Hugh Hefner in the lead, has been frontrunners in human rights. Playboy has been fighting protecting the right of freedom of speech, fighting for equal rights for all people during the civil rights movement and supported the feminist movement by funding precedent cases on abortion rights. According to a series of text analyses by Beggan & Allison (2000, 2002b) Playboy?s editorial direction contradicted conventional definitions of masculinity. Also, the magazine portrayed its Playmates with complex identities that, in many cases, contained a number of traditionally masculine abilities.In this thesis we have done a critical discourse analysis of the Playboy interview and how the gender of its subject is portrayed by the magazine.

The right to freedom of conscience is protected by international conventions and declarations of human rights that have been ratified by Sweden. Nationally, the issue of health professionals? right to freedom of conscience in the abortion care is not resolved by public inquiry. This has led to that Sweden has been notified to the European Committee of Social Rights on the grounds that the country is considered to be violating the Council of  Europe Resolution 1763 and that the proper question to be determined by regulations of the interests that are balanced, based on their legal value in relation to each other. Freedoms, rights and obligations conflict with each other.

The aim of this Masters thesis is to investigate how trained social workers experience information in their daily work. The thesis focussed on three major questions: - What type of information and information sources are mostly used by the trained social workers? - What kind of information barriers are described by the participants? - How can the patterns of information seeking and information use be understood on the basis of the trained social workers professional and social context? Semi-structured interviews were carried out with trained social workers working with child welfare enquiries. My theoretical framework consists of user and context oriented theories about classifications of information, information barriers and models of information sources. My conclusions are that trained social workers working with risk assessment in child protection services, need to use different kinds of information in their daily work, such as problem information, domain information and problem-solving information.

This paper analyses education regarding its profitability from an individual?s perspective. The method for conducting the analysis is an ex ante cost-benefit analysis and the time period examined is between the days the education begins until retirement age. The conclusions of this paper are that tertiary education is not profitable for an individual given the conditions stated in this examination. Furthermore the longer the education lasts, the more unprofitable it is.

The purpose of this study is to make a close and critical scrutiny of the EU Lisbon Strategy and the assumption of `sustainable growth´. A basic question is to clarify what is meant by `sustainability´ in the economic and the environmental dimension respectively, and also, to analyse the meaning of `sustainable growth´. Secondly, I try to investigate the relationship between the economical and environmental dimensions of the strategy. Are the goals of the dimensions compatible and mutually supporting or are they conflicting? By illuminating these issues the study moves towards a final set of questions: What are the arguments that encourage or counteract the Lisbon assumption of `sustainable growth´? Is the European Union approaching `sustainable growth´ looking at different economical and ecological indicators? What are the prospects for the Lisbon Strategy as a way towards global `sustainable development´?.

The basic view on children has change radically in the swedish society during the last century. From beeing seen as ruled by internal evil powers that only church could help controling later on the children should be brought up as citizen well-behaved and capable of work with help of the state's control. Today we see the child as competent and equal, and through Swedens adoption of the U.N. Convention on the Rights of the Child in year 1990, Sweden as a country undertakes itself to always see to the child´s greatest in all decision-making process concerning the child and also vouch for that the rights stated in the convention are beeing fulfild.Working with the convention in a such way that it's intention becomes reality in educational activities requires instruments for the pedagogues. During the years between 1980 and 1990 a number of different methods and programmes were developed with staring-points in the interplay between the child and the adult.

The purpose of this Master?s thesis is to examine the portrayals of class in four Swedish contemporary novels that have been mentioned as working class literature in the literary public sphere. During the 20th century, society has undergone vast changes due to globalization and technology development. The rise in standards of living for most people in the Western societies has led to changed consumption patterns. In consequence, there has been increased emphasis given to cultural rather than materialist explanations of social stratification.

The purpose of this essay was to investigate the view of what kind of role the personal assistant has in disabled people´s life and sexlife and how conceptions of a "normal" life and "to live like others" can be identified related to this. My research questions was: What does the expression "to live like others" mean to the organisations? What is the view in the organisations of the personal assistant´s role in the client´s life? What is the view in the organisations of the personal assistant´s role in the client´s sexlife? What is the view in the organisations of disabled people´s rights to get assisted help with sex? I chose to do semistructured interviews with different organisations related to disability and assistance and I analysed the interviews with theoretical aspects of social constructivism, the principle of normalization and the theory of SRV (Social Role Valorization), autonomy, individualism and models of action. My main conclusion were that the views of disabled people´s sexuality and the personal assistant´s role in disabled people´s sexlife were widely separate. However, almost all of the organisations were pointing out the autonomy of the individual and the importance of setting the limits.

Urbanization and the flight of the creative class drains the countryside when it comes to creativity and talent. Especially the young leave sleepy societies. Richard Florida claims that the city attracts the creative class and enables for economic growth to flourish. Robert Putnam adds to the picture by saying social capital might be equally effective as nourishment for growth. In Uddebo, a rural village in the south of Sweden one combines the two creating a vivid society where creativity flies high and ideas fertilize each other?s.

The purpose of this research is to examine some historical aspects of Robert Putnam?s thesisabout voluntary associations and social capital. According to a micro perspective theory ofsocial capital the trust and reciprocity required and created by associations is important toexplain the disparity between institutional performance and socioeconomic development ofsocieties. The social patterns governing this therefore set a precedent for the future. Using themutual sickness benefit societies in Sweden as variable for voluntary associations around1884, the essay discusses the possible links between social capital, associations and long termeconomic development.

Svartedalens nature reserve a social richness worth develop. The nature reserve of Svartedalen is an area of high biological and social values. The reserve is located close to several densely populated areas. The reserve has been classified as a national area of interest for nature conservation and outdoor life, and as a Natura 2000 area according to both the bird- and habitat directions. The reserve is the largest landarea in Västra Götaland, 3 410 hectares, where a resolution has been made about all these forms of protection. The foundation Skogssällskapet owns 1 956 hectares of the reserve, at 1 384 hectares of the property they pursue FSC-certified silver culture, according to current management plan.

The purpose of this master thesis is to study sponsoring of culture. The questions asked are: What are the reasons for sponsoring? What are the advantages of sponsoring? What are the disadvantages of sponsoring? What is the relation between public grants and sponsoring? The thesis is based upon studies of literature and a case study in Malmoe. Malmoe Public Library received about a million SEK over a period of three years from the foundation of Foreningssparbanken Skane. The money finances two projects, one with new books, Nyhetstorget, and one with strengthened information for small companies, Projekt Förstärkt Näringslivsinformation.

Med dagens låga ränta lånar privatpersoner mer än någonsin för att finansiera sina bostadsköp. Denna uppsats behandlar ränterisken en privatperson utsätter sig för vid bostadsköp då denne skall ta lån med fast ränta. Vanligtvis brukar det ta tre månader (90 dagar) från det att köpekontrakt skrivits på till att köpet genomförts. Genom att anta att ränteförändringarna är lognormalfördelade har jag kommit fram till att tvåårs och femårs räntan inte stiger betydande under 90 dagar. Slutsatsen jag dragit är att ränterisken är låg med dagens låga ränta..

Afghanistan är ett land där motsättningen mellan tradition och modernitet har kännetecknat hela 1900-talet. Skillnaderna mellan utvecklingen i städerna och i landsbygden är stora vilket är en av orsakerna till att landet har splittrats. Olika moderniseringsförsök har utgjorts av olika utomstående aktörer under de senaste 100 åren. Denna undersökning fokuserar på en jämförelse mellan två olika perioder där man har försökt att modernisera Afghanistan. Det första exemplet är Sovjetunionen, från år 1973 fram till år 1991.

Denna studie behandlar EU:s fjäderfänäring och undersöker effekterna av den nya policyn som huvudsakligen består av ett minskat exportstöd. Uppsatsen studerar effekterna på produktion och export. De förväntade effekterna vid ett avskaffande av exportstöd är att både produktion och export ska minska. Denna studie visar, genom att undersöka förändringarna i producerad och exporterad kvantitet från och med 1995 då den nya poliyn började gälla, att i detta fall påverkar andra faktorer produktion och export mer än det minskade exportstödet. Förändringar i konsumenternas preferenser är en faktor som inverkar på produktion och export..